Mimi & Eunice: Permission
IP Law, Mimi & Eunice on IP
Our pervasive permission culture.
~*~
This is a syndicated post, which originally appeared at Mimi and Eunice » IP. View original post.
Mimi & Eunice: Permission Read Post »
In Defense of Bourgeois Civilization
History, Pop Culture
I’m really happy with this way this article turned out. It is published at Crisis. The editor John Zmirak had initially sent me a piece by the legendary historian Christopher Dawson and asked me to respond. I generally avoid this sort of debate so I didn’t bother to look at the piece for probably ten days or so. In fact, I didn’t really accept the challenge.
Then I read the piece. It was quite incredible. Dawson sweeps his scholarly hand over vast continents and epochs and makes wild claims entirely abstracted from the real experience of humanity. Nowhere does he show the slightest interest in the plight of the common man and his quality of life. He is happy to declare the middle ages to be this wonderful time of faith and order and then proceeds to blast away all of the last several hundred years as hopelessly corrupted by materialism. His target is what he calls the bourgeoisie, and here he admits that his thinking is in line with Karl Marx. But there is a difference. Whereas the Marxists posited a hopeless conflict between capital and labor, his model posits a conflict between real faith and material provision. The two are irreconcilable.
The real danger of the Dawson piece is its erudition in big things and its deep disengagement with the small things that make life good, like clean clothes, medical care, running water, job opportunities, access to food to feed the children, and the like. He cares nothing for these things. He is content to simply praise the past for its Michelangos and Berninis and condemn the present for its Lady Gagas and Justin Beibers. It’s really a cheap trick and an obvious one: pick the best of the past and the worst of the present and you can paint a picture of relentless decline.
My response points to the dramatic change that took hold of the world in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, a change that created what we call the middle class today. It gave life to hundreds of millions of people. Without the bourgeoisie and the capitalist marketplace they sustain, the world could not support seven billion. Surely a high-minded cultural historian like Dawson should care about things like this? Surely!
In Defense of Bourgeois Civilization Read Post »
Who Should Control the World?
Anti-Statism, Business
In the days following the gift-giving holidays, many millions of people stand in judgement over the quality of the gifts they gave and the gifts they receive. Did they arrive on time? Did the quality hold up? Did the reality match the advertising hype? The Internet ads an extra wrinkle. Anyone dissatisfied can post blistering attacks on any merchant and the product in questions. Anyone can vote up or vote down.
The down votes are what make the news. The Wall Street Journal tells the story of Scott Mitchell of Connecticut, who purchased from Best Buy and Playstation 3 for his two sons ages 10 and 14.The company let him know via an email that the goods didn’t arrive. He was furious and wouldn’t stop posting diatribes against the company. Eventually, the suits got involved and sent him his full bundle of goods at a low price plus a $200 gift certificate.
“While I can’t say I’m happy, I wound up being satisfied,” Mr. Mitchell told the Journal.
The case was cited as one of many such cases. Consumer demand was so intense that Best Buy got behind. The company didn’t have the inventory it needed to fill all requests. Cyber Monday overloaded the staff and they couldn’t respond fast enough. Any business that hears the story thinks: nice problem to have. Inventory decisions like this require daily clairvoyance.
What’s more important here is what this anecdote indicates about the social order. In this setting above, who is in control? Mr. Mitchell is just one lone guy with one problem with a company that serves untold millions. But he had a voice and his voice was heard. The company scrambled to please him.
…
Who Should Control the World? Read Post »
Kinsella’s “Rethinking Intellectual Property” course: Audio and Slides
IP Law, Libertarian Theory, Science, Technology
Update: now podcast at KOL172.
In late 2010 I taught my first Mises Academy course, “Rethinking Intellectual Property: History, Theory, and Economics.”1 I reprised the course in Spring 2011: “Rethinking Intellectual Property: History, Theory, and Economics.”2 This was a 6-week course, which provided an overview of current intellectual property law and the history and origins of IP. (In Teaching an Online Mises Academy Course, I offer my reflections on teaching the Rethinking IP class the first time.) Here is some feedback provided by past students of this course:
“The class (everything) was perfect. Content wasn’t too deep (nor too shallow) – the reviewed material was just brilliant and the “tuning” was great for someone like myself (engineering background – no profound legal/lawyer experience). It provided all the material to really “understand” (instead of “just knowing”) all that was covered which I find always very important in a class.”
“Instruction was very comprehensive and thought provoking. The instructor was fantastic and very knowledgeable and answered every question asked.”
“Learned more then i expected, the professor seemed to really enjoy teaching the class, and the readings provided were excellent. Overall for the cost I was extremely satisfied.”
“Very interesting ideas I was not exposed to. Inexpensive, convenient, good quality.”
“It is a very fascinating topic and I was quite eager to learn about what I.P. is all about. I thought that Professor Kinsella was able to convey complicated issues to us clearly.”
“Professor Kinsella’s enthusiasm and extra links posted showed his true knowledge and interest in the subject. Great to see.”
And:
Thank you so very much for all the excellent work — very few classes have really changed my life dramatically, actually only 3 have, and all 3 were classes I took at the Mises Academy, starting with Rethinking Intellectual Property (PP350) (the other two were EH476 (Bubbles), and PP900 (Private Defense)). …
My purposes for taking the classes are: 1. just for the fun of it, 2. learning & self-education, and 3. to understand what is happening with some degree of clarity so I can eventually start being part of the solution where I live — or at least stop being part of the problem.
The IP class was a total blast — finally (finally) sound reasoning. All the (three) classes I took dramatically changed the way I see the world. I’m still digesting it all, to tell the truth. Very few events in my life have managed to make me feel like I wished I was 15 all over again. Thank you. …
[M]uch respect and admiration for all the great work done by all the members of the whole team.
Students would often give real-time feedback, in comments such as the following at the end of the lectures (these are from the actual IP-lecture chat transcripts):
- “Thank you, great lecture!”
- “Thanks, excellent lecture.”
- “Great job.”
- “Great lecture!”
- “Thank you, Sir. Great lecture!”
- “Thanks for an excellent talk.”
(Student reaction to the first lecture of my Libertarian Legal Theory course can be found in Student Comments for First Lecture of Libertarian Legal Theory Course: Not Too Late to Sign Up!) In the meantime IP has continued to metastasize and increasingly harm property rights, capitalism, prosperity, technology, and freedom of expression–all, perversely, in the name of “property rights.” The patent smartphone wars have continued to escalate. And copyright, as I argue in here, is even worse. It threatens to enable the state to ratchet up the police state and threatens freedom on the Internet.3 The latest threat in this regard is the evil Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA.
Below is an introductory video for the course followed by the audio and slides for each of the 6 lectures. The “suggested readings” for each lecture are appended to the end of this post.
Update: the audio files may also be subscribed to in this podcast feed. (In iTunes (for Windows) you can subscribe to podcast by copying the feed address to iTunes>Advanced>Subscribe to podcast; on Macs, you can click on the link to have iTunes add it to podcasts.)
Introductory video from the Mises Blog post Kinsella Can Be Your Professor:
Lecture 1: INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY IN HISTORY
Lecture 2: OVERVIEW OF JUSTIFICATIONS FOR IP; PROPERTY, SCARCITY, AND IDEAS …
Kinsella’s “Rethinking Intellectual Property” course: Audio and SlidesRead More »
Discussed on the Mises Blog in Study with Kinsella Online; Lecture 1. ↩
Discussed in Rethinking IP; and on the Mises Blog in Study with Kinsella Online and in Rethinking Intellectual Property: Kinsella’s Mises Academy Online Course. ↩
See my posts The Ominous PROTECT IP Act and the End of Internet Freedom; Copyright and the End of Internet Freedom. ↩
Kinsella’s “Rethinking Intellectual Property” course: Audio and Slides Read Post »
Rothbard vs. CATO’s Richard Epstein on the Benefits of Violent Looting
Anti-Statism, TaxationInteresting post from Libertarian News:
Rothbard vs. CATO’s Richard Epstein on the Benefits of Violent Looting
December 17, 2011By michaelsuede
Adam Liptak and Richard Epstein discuss the most efficient way to rob people.
After listening to Epstein run his ivory tower mouth, my fury over his nonsensical bullshit hath runneth over. A video reading of the following article can be found here for those of you that don’t have the patience to read long text articles.Epstein admits that, “There is no coercive action by government which will have the same beneficent effects of voluntary transactions in competitive markets,” yet flushes his own statement down the toilet when he adds, ”but you can’t get competitive markets with respect to the provision of public goods and you can’t get competitive markets with respect to the operation of network industries.”
Epstein never bothers to explain why “public goods” are of such necessary importance that VIOLENCE against PEACEFUL PEOPLE should be advocated in order to pay for them.
Epstein lists off a few so-called libertarian economists that support the initiation of violence against the innocent to pay for public goods, including Locke and Hayek, but he never bothers to mention the rest of the libertarian economics field, the majority of which disagree with the legitimization of the initiation of violence.
Let’s start off with the parable of the robber by Rothbard to demonstrate why any violent theft can not lead to a more productive society. The following citations all come from the essay The Myth of Neutral Taxation, by Murray Rothbard:
Rothbard vs. CATO’s Richard Epstein on the Benefits of Violent Looting Read Post »